From the Journal of Private Ludwig Beilschmidt
by The-Majestic-Radish
Summary: Private Ludwig Beilschmidt is a soldier in WW1. He keeps a personal journal, in which he writes home to his boyfriend, Feliciano Vargas, telling his of the atrocities of being enlisted and fighting. He hopes that should he be killed, hat his journal will find its way into the hand of his love. Crossover: Hetalia and All Quiet on the Western Front (I still stink at summaries)
1. To my Feli:

From the Journal of Private Ludwig Beilschmidt

To my Feli: In hopes this will find you well,

It's been 14 days now, Feli, of our unit relieving the front lines, and it has been nearly a full year since I have seen your smiling face. Life has not gotten any easier. Everyone seems to be close to death or dead. One of the soldiers, Franz Kemmerich, lost his leg from the thigh down. I don't think he will make it through the next day or two. Müller already has his sights set on getting his boots. God knows how we could all use new boots. This war is awful, absolutely awful. It is nothing like our schoolmaster's told us it would be like. They told us of the glory of war, and how we, "The Iron Youth" would become proud heroes of war. However that is not the case, it never will be. Our entire elder generation is "convinced that they are acting for the best-in a way that costs them nothing".

Feli, I've come to believe that it has all been a lie, from day one.

They have betrayed us, and in no small fashion. They told us of the 'glorious' battles fought throughout all of history; of how men come back as heroes. But now, after only a few days on the front, it is clear to me, that what they told us, were merely fairy tales, and told nothing of the reality or the truth of what war really is.

We are continuously fighting for their cause, following their orders and losing our lives. This war we are fighting, is because of them, and they are doing nothing to stop it, except for sending us out to fight their battles. So many have died, more than I can bear to count.

We are no longer the Iron Youth, I am no longer so naïve as to think our commanders are the infallible men in this war that you and I thought them to be.

I know now that I am continuously fighting not only the enemy, but the thoughts of losing any hope I once had to come out of this alive and being able to see you again. I know that I must continue onward, I must push through this, despite our superiors betrayal. I will not go down without a fight, I will persevere.

* * *

 **A note from the Radish:**

 **HELOOOO LOVELY READERS! And how are you this fine place in time? I am back with an all new story.. series.. journal entries.. thingy...**

 **Yeaaaahhh...**

 **It was an English assignment.. (again) and we had to write journals using quotes from a book...and.. well... I turned it into fan fiction to make it more enjoyable to write.. After all this is based off a book that was set in WW1... In Germany.. In the point of view of a German soldier..**

 **It was practically screaming "Oh please miss majestic radish! I wish to enter the world anew as a fan fiction"**

 **Naturally I responded,"Meh, sure, why not." And so here we have it!**

 **Okay guys so as a warning, yes, these chapters will be short. But that's only because I want this story to have the feeling of separate journal entries for each chapter.**

 **The rest of the chapters will be posted throughout the next two weeks or so. I like spreading things out. Plus final are/were coming up so I have to /had to study.**

 **Please leave reviews if you liked it!**

 **If you didn't, well, then you don't have to keep reading and I'm sorry I wasted your time. (Not really)**

 **Aaaaaannny who.. Radish out!**

(Hint: the name of the book is.. drumroll... _All Quiet on the Western Front)_


	2. Fairytales

Each day seems to drag on forever, the days without any movement in the units are rather boring. Some of the men sit on our makeshift toilet for hours on end, reading mail and laughing. I suppose all this waiting around is better than the alternative.

Men are still being taken to the medical tent, waiting for treatment. The beds are all taken. Each time there is a new soldier to be treated, the medics have to wait around for others to die so those beds can be used as soon as possible. It is a gruesome sight.

Oh how I wish to go home and see you again Feli. I am not certain how much longer I can stand to see all the bodies and all the death.

I have seen some of the strongest and some of the best soldiers from other units be struck down. I know that I am at least near their level of training, and even still, if they don't make it, what chance do I have?

This war is still nothing like my schoolmasters' have described previous wars to be like. I now see "that the classical conception of the Fatherland held by my teachers resolved itself here on the front into a renunciation of personality…".

No amount of training can really prepare me, or anyone else, for the reality of the battlefield, despite what our commanders say. In a real battle, you have to ignore any emotion; fear, anger, pain. All those emotions have to disappear, otherwise, make one impulsive move, and you're dead.

Our teachers glorified the war so we would enlist. I was under that impression when I enlisted, I didn't even think twice. Now I wish I could've known the truth behind the wall of illusions and fairytales.


	3. Cornflower Crowns

Feli, do you remember our younger days together? When you and I were just kids, with not a care in the world? Before we graduated into the higher grades, before this war began.

We spent our lazy summer days in the fields of cornflowers.

You would always make flower crowns and insist that I wear one.

If I refused, I remember how you would always, without fail, comment on how my eyes were the same color as the flowers, and say how they would look wonderful in my hair.

If that didn't work, you would just whine until I finally had to give in. Sometimes you acted like such a girl.

When we entered the secondary level, that was when our so called 'proud' history was first taught to us.

It was probably when I first even thought of enlisting as a soldier, even though you and I were only twelve. Only six years later, after years of studying instead of playing, I enlisted.

Feli, I am so glad you didn't enlist. You are safe, and that thought is what keeps me going. Especially when we are only a few miles from the frontlines.

The pressure on our unit is now decreased, but only by a little; "reinforcements have [finally] arrived. . . they are about two years younger than [the rest] of us".

I noticed that Kropp nudged Bäumer and they both began to strut around the young ones, like old experts of battle.

All of the recruits look fresh out of the hands of our previous schoolmasters', their eyes tell their story. They still believe what they were told in school.

How could they just leave home? They have the rest of their life ahead of them at 18, but now they have practically thrown it away.

The irony is that I was much the same. I only wish that I had known what I was giving up when I enlisted.

I gave up not only time and possibly my future with you, but my youth, has also forever been lost to this god awful war.


	4. The Screams of Nature Itself

We returned to the frontlines last night. I am still alive, albeit a bit shaken.

The ride in the lorries is crammed; we stood packed together in the vehicle, shoulder to shoulder with no room to sit.

Quite a few of the men who came were the new recruits, the rest were from unit 5 and my unit. The majority of the men are silent, listening and watching, on high alert for any sign of danger or unfriendly fire. I overhear Kat say that there will be a bombardment. His words penetrate us all, because on the front, his opinion can become the truth in a matter of seconds.

Once we arrived, we took refuge in a small stand of trees where our lorries dropped us off.

We, along with the rest of the troops, file up as columns of horsemen and munitions pass by.

The men no longer recognizable as men and the horses on which they ride were indistinguishable in the moonlight, but their movement remained beautiful.

Not long after, a red glow spread across the sky and the bombardment began.

I have certainly fought before on the front lines Feli, I know what war is like, but what we witnessed in combat last night, was beyond hell.

The rockets began to land all around our trench, getting closer and closer and closer.

We crawled away hastily, unfortunately the horses in the field often could not avoid the shells and bullet.

Some die but others are wounded badly. As they fall or try to run, their hellish screams echoed through the night and smoke.

Their cries were "the mourning of the world… the martyred creation, wild with anguish, filled with terror and groaning.

We all began turning pale.

One of the men, Detering, stands up. 'God! For God's sake! Shoot them.'... Then as if deliberately the fire [died] down again. The screaming of the beasts becomes louder " .

Eventually, well aimed shots could be heard and the beast came crashing to the earth, their black silhouettes falling to the earth.

The majestic beasts should never have been brought to the battlefield. It is only us soldiers to blame for the demise of those beasts of nature.

They are noble animals, unlike our commanders.

You are lucky Feli, to only hear of this second hand, because experiencing it is much worse. We used to depend on these animals for survival, and now look what we have done to them. We have replaced them with machines, yet still bring them to battle.


	5. Change

All this time spent on the front has changed me as a man Feli. It is becoming harder and harder to imagine myself ever living a normal life again.

Some of the men talk of what they will do during peacetime, if such a time were to ever come.

There are some, like Kat, Detering and Haie, who will go home and back to their jobs because they had them already, but I don't have work to go back to.

Most of the men are not as lucky as the few of us who have someone waiting for them at home.

It is nice to know that I have you waiting for me after the war, Feli, so long as you have stayed true to the promise you made before I had to leave.

"When I think about it… 'It will go pretty hard with us all… Two years of shells and bombs - a man won't peel that off as easy as a sock.'

We all agree that it is the same for everyone… everywhere, for everyone who is our age…

It is the common fate of our generation". None of use will come out without emotional scars let alone physical ones.

We have seen too much to forget, and there is not enough time in the world to ever unsee the horrors of the battlefield.

All the dead men strewn across the earth, bodies piled up in heaps, the sick and injured in the medical tent, men and boys never to see home again.

It is only luck that I am able to write to you, and that the worst I've gotten is a scrape or three to the arm. Others have lost so much more.

If I do make it out of this alive, I hope you will still love me, despite my experiences on the front having changed me forever.


	6. One Thousand Chances

There are rumors circling around of an offensive attack by the English. We had to move up to the frontlines at least two days earlier than originally planned. As we left, we saw that coffins are already built and lined up against a shelled schoolhouse. It seemed like they were for us, as a warning of what was to come.

The battle itself was awful. We were under a constant barrage by the French. Where they get all those shells, is a mystery.

Our own guns are worn out, and we are low on ammunition.

Everyone is huddled together to protect ourselves from the oncoming barrage.

Like they say, strength in numbers, but to be honest I don't know if we are going to survive, the chances seem low.

Throughout this whole war "It is just a matter of chance that I am still alive as that I might have been hit.

In a bomb-proof dug-out I may be smashed to atoms and in the open may survive ten hours' bombardment unscathed.

No soldier outlives a thousand chances. But every soldier believes in Chance and trusts his luck".

Still, our commanding officers and the higher ups are clearly becoming more desperate.

Our reinforcements are barely out of training and are practically fresh from the schoolyard. Even with the the new recruits, our chances are dwindling down

I know that I need to do whatever it takes to survive this. It will take all my courage to continue on and to not come home as a coward.

I can only hope that my luck will not run out too soon, so that I can come home to you Feli.

Post Script - This battle has finally finished. Do not worry my Feli, I am safe and sound, just a few minor cuts from the wires.

I cannot say the same for the rest of my company, only 32 of us are left.


	7. Will This War Ever End?

I was given two weeks leave, Feli, along with a few other men. Unfortunately we are nowhere near Hamburg, so I cannot visit you.

I ended up travelling to the same city as Bäumer. I believe it is called Dolbenberg.

It is not such a bad place, however it is easy to see that the people here hardly get enough food. Despite that, I'm sure during peacetime it is a lovely bustling place.

But for now, it is nice to enjoy the peace and quiet.

When I am left to my own thoughts they stray back to the front. I have been focused for such a long time on the war, that it is exceedingly difficult to stop thinking about it.

I have noticed that the only thing that can bring me out of my thoughts is thinking of home. You are what keeps me going Feli, I fight so that I know you are safe and so that this war can end.

There is a bar in this town, and, since I have no one to visit, I spend quite of bit of time there.

While at the bar, I often eavesdrop into the conversations of other soldiers on leave and some of the local schoolmasters.

One conversation in particular caught my attention just last night. Paul Bäumer also attended the bar that night, and an old German-master and some others began to talk of the war. All the schoolmasters believe the war on the front is a breeze of shooting the french dead and good food rations.

It was difficult not to laugh at their assumptions, and more so to not walkover and bash their heads together in an effort to make them realize what the reality of it all actually is.

When they began to talk of ways in which the Germans could win the war, Paul attempted to provide a more realistic plan.

However, the German-master "dismissed the idea loftily and informed Bäumer that he knew nothing about it.

'The details, yes,' says he, 'but this relates to the whole. And of that end of that you are not able to judge. You see only your little sector and so cannot have any general survey. You do your duty, you risk your lives, that deserves the highest honor-every man of you ought to have the Iron Cross-but first of all the enemy line must be broken through...'".

The schoolmasters' speak as if they are all knowing, always right, and still imagine the lies they themselves told to us are true.

I honestly don't believe that they have the slightest clue as to what the war is really like.

I tell you Feli, I would find it extremely amusing to see them put into our shoes.

Watching how their faces would change as they witnessed the front.

Their distorted view of the war would probably crumble at the sight of their own blood.


	8. Russians

My time on leave has now finished, and I have to report to an old training camp located in the moors. This brings back memories of the week training in the mud and covered in sweat. Long before I had actually experienced battle.

The camp is surrounded with high barbed wire fences. Also, to the west, right beside the camp is a Russian prison camp. The prisoners there often beg the men on our side for food. of any kind. Feli, "to see these enemies of ours so close up. They have faces that make one think - honest peasant faces, broad foreheads, broad noses, broad mouths, broad hands, and thick hair... A word of command has made these silent figures our enemies; a word of command might transform them into our friends".

It is odd, Feli, I am not used to seeing the enemy close up. Because, if I was, well, I wouldn't be able to write these journals for you.

The figures behind the fences, look like any other human beings. Not monsters, not devils. Just ordinary men like you. Like your brother. Like my brother. Like me.

I have not told you everything, Feli. Sometimes it it just too morbid to recall, and to write the experiences I have had during the battles I have managed to survive in. But I believe I have written enough so that you know just what this war is really like.

However I feel that you have the right to know something, Feli, that I have not said to you directly in these journals.

From here on out, the hope for a German victory is minute, and probably non existent.

I have fought bravely, but only to survive. I am not brave, nor is anyone else. No one in this war is brave. We never will be.


	9. Iron Cross

Daily training has now been ordered for all men at the camp. Once again it's back to drills, marching and presenting arms. We are being trained as show ponies once more.

A week or so has now passed. Today we were visited by the Kaiser himself.

We all lined up; backs straight, shoulders square, feet together.

He inspected us one by one as he passed, and began to hand out Iron Crosses to some of the men in line to my right. He continued down the line and stopped in front of me.

Pinning an Iron Cross to my uniform, he told me, that it is as thanks for my service to the Fatherland and for my bravery for fighting in the war.

I am proud to receive this honor, however I also feel the weight that the medal's meaning brings.

After the whole of the inspection, we returned the new uniforms we were required to wear and go back to our barracks.

There the men discuss a variety of things. I happen to visit some of the other men that stay with Bäumer and his friends. Incidentally, I overhear their conversation. It is hard not to.

They discuss how wars start in the first place. Wouldn't we all like to know how it started, so that we could end it.

Their conversation eventually shifts to the purpose for wars. Tjaden was the one who voiced this question.

"Kat just shrugged his shoulders. 'There must be some people to whom the war is useful.'

'Well, I'm not one of them,' grins Tjaden. 'Not you. nor anybody else here'" . Tjaden has a point, and it is one I have been contemplating

throughout this entire war.

Soldiers die for the commanders. The commanders die when the soldiers are gone. Next schoolmasters and any able bodied men will be sent to fight and die. At that point, who is left to fight?

No one benefits from this war. Not even those who began it.


	10. Our Knowledge Limited to Death

We have been sent to evacuate a village. Families have packed few of their belongings and are now walking away from their home.

Out of the blue, we came under heavy fire and bombs.

Our men began to scramble for cover. Others, like myself, helped the evacuees find shelter as well.

The barrage continues and I see Bäumer and Kropp make a run for some bushes. Kropp has clearly been injured in his thigh. The blood is soaking through his uniform.

Somehow he and Bäumer were able to hide in a pond right near a field.

As soon as the fire let up, they called for the ambulance wagon. Kropp now can't move his leg at all, and it looked like Bäumer had taken a bullet in the arm and leg.

Those two are surely going to be put on a train and headed to a hospital. Those are the kind of wounds that we cannot treat well on the front.

Im sure, that despite the comfort of being away from the front, it must be dreadful in the hospitals.

They are filled with all our sick, injured and dying. And this war has cause most if not all of those men to be there.

Feli, "a hospital alone shows what war is. I am young, I am twenty years old; yet I know nothing of life but despair, death, fear, and fatuous superficiality cast over an abyss of sorrow.

I see how peoples are set against one another, and in silence, unknowingly, foolishly, obediently, innocently slay one another.

I see that the keenest brains of the world invent weapons and words to make it yet more refined and enduring.

And all men of my age, here and over there, throughout the whole world see these things; all my generation is experiencing these things with me…

Through the years our business has been killing; - it was our first calling in life.

Our knowledge of life is limited to death now. What will happen afterwards? And what shall come out of us?".

Men from around the world, are all suffering as we are. There are no real differences between us. Only where we come from, and even then, the only thing that separates us is our leaders.

Feli, I'm sure that if this war ever ends, all the countries and all their people will either forgive and forget, or forever remember and regret.

But for now, we are stuck in this hellish war.


	11. Human Lives

We are surrounded by the English, our trenches no longer hold, and we fight from crater to crater.

The english and American troops easily overrun our troops. We are easily outnumbered. Men who lost limbs in this war have now been ordered to return and fight. Our side is clearly desperate.

Moral is falling lower and there seems to be no hope for an end to this war. At least, not an end where there are German survivors.

Feli, do you remember Kemmerich? The man who lost his life and gave his boots to Müller?

To be blunt "Müller is dead now.

Someone shot him point-blank in the stomach with a Very light. He lived for half an hour, quite conscious, and in terrible pain".

In that time, before he left this world for good, he gave his boots to Bäumer, the same ones he had inherited form Kemmerich.

In this war, lives are cheap. Boots seem to be the most valuable thing a man has to pass on to a fellow comrade.

They are also the most durable thing in this war, as human lives are so frail a thing

I experienced this firsthand today.

In one attack we lost over 50 men. We had to retreat, many men are injured, and struggle to move on, or simply lie in the dirt, as they cannot walk hoping the medics will find them.

Today, I am/was one of those men.

I was shot a total of 6 times in my left leg. I could hardly move it, the pain was unbearable.

I was lucky enough to be found and transported to the hospital. There they told me that the wounds will take months to heal.

And even then, I may never be able to use it again.

I have tried to fight hard and with valor in this war, but now, that is all over.

.

I can finally come home.


	12. The Great War

November 11, 1918

* * *

Well Feli, this is it. The war is finally over, and this is that last journal entry I will write to you.

Germany surrendered.

The Armistice was signed in France at 5 o'clock a.m., between Germany, the allied Governments, and the United States. It is over, the battle is lost and won.

Newspapers all around the world are probably printing in big letters: AN END TO THE GREAT WAR!

It is called the great war, though I find that extremely ironic. The war was not Great at all, no matter how you look at it. I know that first hand, and now you know it secondhand.

Germany's government is going to become one of the people.

I'm certain it is going to have its hands full with reparations and trying to find the fastest way to peace time for the people. Of course the only way that will ever be accomplished is if every official and the country as a whole helps.

The paper believes that "the political transformation should not trouble the people. The food supply is the first duty of all, whether in town or country, and they should not embarrass but rather aid, the production of food supplies and their transport to towns… The poorest will suffer the most and the industrial worker will be affected the hardest." .

I cannot argue with that, for it is true.

Everyone has been affected by this "Great War", everyone has suffered, and everyone will continue to suffer as the more of the consequences of the war begin to show themselves.

* * *

You did your part in the war, though not by enlisting.

You helped the people in our town, you were able to make fresh pasta and give it to the were probably one of the most important people in the world to this town, and I am proud of you. You kept people in higher spirits despite all the hell that was around you. You, Feli are the brave one.

It has been only a few weeks since I have been home with you once more. It is wonderful to see your face again, and to be able to hold you in my arms.

My leg does not allow me to help you much, but you make me feel as though I am still useful.

We have long years ahead of us together. They may be hard, but as long as we are together, and as long as I have you, we will live.

* * *

There is one more thing I have to tell you Feli.

As you know, in reality, I do not express much of anything to you of emotions and feelings. The war only hardened that way of thinking for me.

However it also showed me what life would be like if no one shared sentiments or had emotions, and what the world would be like if no one showed their humanity until the very end, when it is too late.

I want to fix that now, to tell you something I have been meaning to say and wanting to say for years, and make it so that my words are forever.

Feliciano Vargas, Ich liebe dich.


End file.
